Become a Green Business

A green business (or sustainable business) is a business that causes no negative impact on the local or global environment, the community, or the economy. Green business are both socially and environmentally responsible, and are focused on implementing principles and practices that benefit their employees, community, and the planet. Consumers may be particularly drawn to green business because of their reputation as companies that protect environmental resources, ensure the well-being of both employees and those who supply the company, and constantly revise their approaches to make them more aligned with sustainability and reducing environmental impact. Becoming green as a business is not a one-off change; it's an ongoing endeavor that requires constant learning and improving.

Steps

Recognizing the Ideals of a Green Business

1. Consider ecological and social effects. In order to be considered a green business, ecological and social effects must always be taken into consideration and must be put ahead of profits when creating a product or selling a service. For example, this means that products should not be created in factories that exploit human labor for low wages. To be a green business, you must vow to be cognizant of both people and the environment.
2. Prevent pollution. A green business will minimize the amount of toxins included in any product. In addition, they will mitigate the toxins that are produced in association with the production of their product to make sure that there is no harmful influence on people and/or the environment. For example, this includes the guarantee that manufacturing and delivery processes are environmentally friendly.
3. Involve the community. A green business will become integrated with the community in which it operates. It will encourage employee volunteerism, donations, and cause marketing. This can involve events such as forums to educate and encourage consumers to be more educated about the tenants of green business and how to support green businesses in their community.
4. Conserve water and energy. A green business will keep all consumption of consumables such as water and energy to as minimal a level as possible. All waste and pollution should be kept to a minimum. When possible, alternative fuel sources should be used as a source of energy.
5. Incorporate the three R’s. The “three R’s” are reduce, reuse, and recycle. Green businesses make these activities a priority in order to lessen their environmental impact.
6. Pay attention to sourcing. Green businesses will source their materials from green suppliers and make use of natural products whenever possible. In addition to using green suppliers, green businesses will also source locally whenever possible, even if cheaper materials are available elsewhere.

Examining Your Business Practices

1. Determine your ecological impact. The first step in becoming a green business is understanding your business’s current carbon and ecological footprint. Just as you can calculate your personal carbon footprint (for example, at http://www.nature.org/greenliving/carboncalculator/), you can also calculate how your company is impacting the environment.
   • In order to estimate the carbon footprint of your company (and to see how it compares to other companies within your sector), you will be required to provide information about your business, including information about your facilities, employees, travel, and procurement to an online website.
   • By knowing your carbon footprint, you can set goals for becoming carbon neutral.
   • Conduct your ecological footprint analysis with the Global Footprint Network: http://www.footprintnetwork.org/en/index.php/GFN/page/footprint_for_business/.
2. Identify practices that require improvement. In order to become a green business, you will need to identify which of your business practices are in need of “greening.” For example, airline flights are one of the biggest causes of carbon emissions in the world. Is it possible for you to implement more efficient travel into your company’s business plan?
3. Set goals for improvement. Decide what parts of your business you can reasonably make more “green”, and set out a strategy for improvement. You should set goals in regular increments; for example, where do you want your business to be in one year? Two years? Five years? Ten years? You should look to improve more and more with each passing year.
   • Some of the practices that will make your company more green may conflict with your previous business practices. For example, you may be able to source a raw material for a product from a cheap overseas producer; however, in order to be green, you should look to see if you could source the material locally, even if it is more expensive. Realize that you may have to adjust your business strategy and/or budget when becoming a green business.

Developing a Green Strategy for Your Business

1. Envision changes that will improve your business. You will want to make sure that the changes that you plan to implement will actually improve your business. You will need to pay attention to not only improving the “greenness” of your business, but also maintaining a financially successful company.
   • After determining what changes you wish to make (for example, will you ensure that no products are created in sweatshops overseas? Will you develop bylaws that outline the social and environmental objectives that you wish to achieve?), you will need to understand how these changes will impact the functioning of your business overall.
   • Ensure that you are only committing to making changes that you will be able to implement. Make sure that you practice what you preach.
2. Create an improvement strategy. After you determine where your business is now (in terms of its ecological impact) and where you want the business to be in the future, you can begin to think about what resources, tools and approaches will be used to get there. A strategy can be as simple or as complex as you want but it needs to be workable, feasible, and realistic.
   • Consult business books for advice on creating green business strategies. These books can provide techniques and advice on developing a successful green business. Do a Google search for the “best books about green business” in order to obtain a list of books that may provide helpful advice as you become a green business yourself.
     • For a great starting point, try the popular The Truth About Green Business by Gil Friend.
   • As part of your strategy development, decide whether you will do more than just “green” your existing premises and practices. Are there ways that you can expand more into the workings of a green business? For example, is it possible for your business to move into creating green products and services as well?
3. Consult other green companies. Before you start working to make your business greener, speak with the owners or managers of other green businesses in your area. Ask them what challenges they faced, what mistakes they made, what advice they would like if they had to make the move from non-green to green business again. Learn from the errors that others have made to facilitate your own experience at becoming a green business.
   • You can find other green businesses using Green America’s National Green Pages (http://www.greenpages.org/).

Reducing Your Business's Overall Consumption

1. Observe what your business uses and wastes. This can include resources such as energy, supplies and other materials. Make this list available to all your employees so that they know how much is being consumed on a monthly, quarterly, or yearly basis.
2. Decide where you can cut back. This is probably the most cautious and most effective beginning point for any established business in terms of starting to go green. By cutting pack, you can start saving your company money almost immediately. Seeing immediate results will give you (and your employees) incentive to keep going.
   • For example, consider making a preliminary goal of cutting back on energy usage. If you decided to use compact-fluorescent lights or LED lights, you will use 75 percent less energy than traditional incandescent bulbs. This means that you will save roughly $200 per bulb over time because these bulbs last longer and use less energy than standard lightbulbs.
     • Use this Energy Savings Calculator to help determine the value of switching to energy efficient bulbs: http://www.bulbs.com/learning/energycalc.aspx.
3. Look at the company's paper usage. How much paper does your business use daily? Studies show that a typical office disposes approximately 350 pounds of waste paper per employee per year. Can you cut down on your paper use? Try switching to digital procedures to invoice your clients and pay your bills. Scan in important contracts and email them rather than printing them and putting them in the mail. Discourage staff in your office from printing every email or even other documentation.
   • Teach workers how to sort their emails, so they don’t have to rely on hard copies. Encourage them to read necessary presentations, emails, or documents on screen.
   • When printing is necessary, use both sides of the paper (double-sided printing). To make sure people remember this, it's helpful if you set your printer to automatically print double sided. You can also program your fax machine not to print out confirmation pages.
   • When you do have to use paper, make sure you use post-consumer waste (PCW) paper. PCW paper is made completely from paper that is put in recycling bins and requires 45 percent less energy and makes half the waste of traditional paper making.
4. Provide proper employee training. Be sure to properly train your employees on using the equipment that they need to use. This will help to ensure workers don't make mistakes or waste resources. While it may not seem like a business practice that will help make your business more green, you may be surprised at the positive impact it will have on the greenness of your company.
5. Check your business's appliances and machinery. This will give you a better idea about your business’s energy efficiency. This constitutes another area in which you can reduce consumption and waste. Make sure that all of your equipment is up-to-date and working properly.
   • If your appliances or machinery require servicing, make sure it is done regularly. This will make sure that the machinery stays in top condition and will make a more pleasant work experience for your employees as well.
   • If you are in need of new or updated appliances, look for Energy Star appliances which have labels that will help you to assess their energy requirements.
6. Keep facilities and utilities in good shape. Even the things your company isn't using directly to make products or selling can be resource wasters. For example, do you have energy-efficient hand dryers in your restrooms, or are you still depending on paper towels?
   • Check things like faucets and toilets. If you have a leaky faucet or a cracked toilet, get it fixed to avoid wasting valuable resources.
   • Make sure that your staff turns off all the lights and equipment at the end of the day to avoid wasting energy when no one is at work. It's helpful to assign someone to be responsible for this daily. Put up signs around the workplace to remind everyone. After a quarter or a year, put up charts showing a comparison of energy savings thanks to employees’ efforts. This will help to motivate your employees to keep up energy-conscious behaviors.
   • Switch to energy efficient appliances. Compact fluorescent bulbs use 15 to 20 percent of the energy of an incandescent bulb, last longer and produce as much light.
7. Incentivize a reduction in consumption. Post a list of energy, supply, and material usage (you can focus on how much is used per month, per quarter, or per year), and alongside this list, post a list of goals for the end of a period of time. Include an incentive if your company can reach your goals.
   • For example, you may want to incentivize your employees with a casual dress day for reaching a resource-reduction goal, or you may want to create an intra-company competition that pits one department against another and offers something like an extra vacation day for the department that reduces consumption the most.
8. Find out if your state has any 'green rebates' or incentives for energy reduction. Many states will help you with appliance replacements, light bulb replacements, insulation, window replacements, etc.
   • Do a Google search for free energy audits. Many states will perform these energy audits for free, and some will pay for some or all necessary repairs. This can help to identify simple changes that can be made to make yours a greener business.

Reusing What You Have

1. Identify reusable office supplies. Take a look around your business for items that you could easily reuse. It is probable that there will be many things, even ones you haven't thought of before. By trying to reuse some of the items that are office necessities, you can become a greener business.
   • Paper is a good place to start. While paper is easy to reuse and recycle, it constitutes about 35 percent of the world’s waste. In order to reuse paper, start a scrap bin so that people can use paper scraps rather than grabbing a fresh page each time they need to scribble a quick memo.
   • When possible, use chalkboards or whiteboards instead of poster boards or large sheets of paper during brainstorming sessions with your office. While you will have to purchase chalk and/or dry erase markers, you will save a lot of money by reducing your use of paper.
2. Place reusable items in your break room. This area is one which will probably be easy for you to improve the greenness of your company. For example, a simple and easy step to becoming greener is to stop supplying paper and plastic dishes and utensils. Purchase glass dishes and real silverware and encourage employees to use them and to clean them after use (and purchase dish soap and cleaning supplies that are biodegradable and free from any harmful chemicals!).
   • Purchase reusable coffee filters and Choose a Promotional Coffee Mug for the morning coffee. Provide each employee with their own mug, and encourage them to keep it at work and use it each day.
   • For catering purposes, if washing up is not an option, choose disposable items made from corn, potatoes or other plant sources that break down in the compost instead of Styrofoam or standard paper plates.
3. Provide reusable water bottles. If you have a water jug in your workplace, reduce the use of disposable one-time-use cups by providing each employee with a plastic, glass, or stainless steel water bottle. Inspire company pride by getting your company name or logo printed on the bottle. Even if you don’t have a water jug, providing these water bottles will encourage your employees to bring less plastic water bottles.
   • Ensure that these bottles are free of BPA and any other harmful chemicals.
4. Start an office supply exchange. Designate one area where people can drop off any excess office supplies or old equipment (for example, extra staplers, extra staples, extra pads of post-it notes, extra pens and pencils, etc.). Encourage your employees to donate what they can when they have extra supplies that they don’t need, and to browse the supply exchange area before asking for a purchase of new supplies.

Recycling What You Can

1. Provide an indoor compost bin. Place a compost bin in your workplace kitchen or break room and your encourage workers to add their lunch scraps to it. Charge one employee with emptying your compost bin into an outdoor container on a daily or weekly basis.
2. Make Install Built in Recycling Bins easy. To make your business a greener place, put a well-labeled recycling bin next to every trash can. Put extra recycling bins in the break room, by the copy machine and in the mail room to encourage your employees to recycle rather than just throwing stuff away.
   • Place a memo above the recycling bin telling employees what items should go in the recycling bin. This will both help prevent confusion and will inspire recycling.
3. Educate your staff on ways they can recycle at the office. You will need the participation of your staff in order to become a green business. Some easy things to start recycling are paper, plastic, and aluminum cans. Make sure your staff knows where they can find the recycling bins and what goes in them by holding a staff meeting that explains the benefits of recycling in the workplace and the expectations of all employees to participate in company recycling.

Involving Staff and Community

1. Encourage use of public transportation. Discuss with your employees how public transportation, driving a hybrid vehicle, or biking or walking to work can make your company greener (and reduce the individual carbon footprint of each employee as well!) The easiest way to go green during commuting is to avoid driving whenever possible.
   • If you have a particularly high percentage of employees who use alternative methods of transportation to commute to and from work, it will help demonstrate your commitment to environmental care.
   • If public transportation isn’t available in your area, encourage carpooling. You can also incentivize carpooling by creating carpool-only parking spots.
2. Get your staff on board. In order to truly become a green business, you will need to get your staff on board with your green goals. To get your staff on board, you need to make green thinking a part of your company culture. By doing this, you'll have both a motivated team and some evangelists who will take the greening further than you can do alone. Staff engagement is vital for long-term success and they can help to spread the word to other staff, clients and through networks.
   • Explain to staff what is hoped for by way of continual improvement. Make sure that they all understand the commitment to continual improvement and agree to contribute in any way possible.
   • Encourage participation in community activities that make the surrounding area a more pleasant place to live (this can include activities such as river clean-ups, establishing a community garden, or planting trees along a stretch of highway) and recognize those employees who choose to participate.
3. Create a committee for greening your business. Choose people already interested in this change along with those who have the power to implement changes. Ideas need to be tested in this environment, so even a few naysayers can be useful as sounding boards. Encourage this committee to meet on a regular basis to track progress and discuss future greening practices.
   • Encourage brainstorming on ways to make your business greener. Incentivize the best ideas with awards or accolades.
   • Appoint one green evangelist per department or area of your workplace communicate the committee's ideas, information and decisions and to generally rally support for greening the business.
4. Get feedback from staff about green changes. Listen as avidly to the complaints as the praise. This will help you know what is and isn't working.
5. Assign specific greening tasks within a set time frame. Set tangible goals that should be reached in a reasonable amount of time in order to stay on track with your green business strategy.
6. Provide a green fund. Consider providing a green fund for specific areas to use when implementing their own departmental solutions. However, be sure that the idea benefits the whole company in a way you consider appropriate.

Building Your “Green Business” Reputation

1. Become certified. Having independent green accreditation on a product or service can reassure customers that your business is honest and the "real thing", saving your customers from having to check up in your claims. For example, you can become certified by the Green Business Bureau (GBB) by visiting their website at http://www.gbb.org/.
   • Becoming a certified green business will provide you resources and guidance for continued improvement, will help you gain marketing visibility for your greening efforts, and will keep you up to date with the latest advancements in sustainable technology.
2. Be transparent. Authentically green companies will pride themselves in educating their consumer about their product as well as its production.
3. Approach greening your business as a journey. Your business needs to keep learning and implementing new green practices, new green technologies, and new ways to save resources and be efficient. Read widely, talk to others running green businesses and keep looking for opportunities to share your own business's expertise and help others. Indeed, the more your business learns, the more likely it will be that your business becomes a leader in green business.
   • Create an internal culture that never stops learning about green business and encourages employees to keep giving ideas and implementing various practices (some that will be successes, and some that will fail) that help your business stay green.
   • Stay networked with other green business through online forums and websites that provide connections with other green businesses.
   • Keep people updated on your business's experiences through your website and reports.

Tips

• You might consider looking into environmental management systems (EMS). In some cases, you might be able to find an EMS that can be implemented over time, to allow a more gradual and less costly changeover to the new system.
• Understand why the business case is stacked in favor of greening your business. Going green will save money for the business. Consumers are more proactive and green-conscious than ever before. Social media, magazine articles, word-of-mouth and worldwide protests have consumers understanding more and more that green practices are essential for a more sustainable world. Many consumers are actively demanding that companies do their bit to ensure that the environment is protected.
• It's probable that you can't move your business into a more eco-efficient building right now. But do find ways to make the existing building more efficient, including asking the landlord to make improvements if possible. Your business might even plan to move to more efficient quarters sometime in the future.
• Beware of green washing. If your business can't do something the greener way, don't provide any false information to your consumers. Instead, explain that your business is working on changes and expects to have green improvements by a particular future date instead. This will show that you're actively working on improving the greenness of your business.
• Green fatigue can set in for you and your staff and/or for clients. When this happens, take a close look at what is happening and see how you can rejuvenate the motivation and energy that has gone awry.
• Keep checking resources, savings and costs. Rein in any costs that are not warranted or that are harming the company. Sometimes you may need to wait before implementing the next step. Always be sure that there are sufficient resources for proceeding with any green initiatives.

Related Articles

• Go Green at Work
• Start Your Own Business
• Write a Business Plan
• Save the Environment While Shopping
• Be Efficient and Eco Friendly
• Find an Eco Friendly Website Hosting Company

Sources and Citations

See also

• Start a Publishing Company
• Start a Clothing Line
• Start a Small Business
• Start a Campground Business
• Start a Recycling Business
• Set up an Internet Cafe
• Start a Beauty Salon
• Start an Invitation Printing Business
• Open a Car Wash Business
• Start Your Own Business

Read more ...